


let your heart be light (next year all our troubles will be out of sight)

by kidwonder



Category: Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: Christmas Fluff, Dancing, F/F, Mistletoe, just pure fluff and adorableness
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-25
Updated: 2018-12-25
Packaged: 2019-09-27 08:57:51
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,317
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17159057
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kidwonder/pseuds/kidwonder
Summary: Standing this close, Yaz can count all the freckles on the Doctor's face. She reaches out, strokes her thumb over the Doctor’s jaw. The moment has gone on too long for just a casual Christmas kiss. There might still be time for an eggnog-tipsy lapse in judgement, but Yaz doesn’t drink. She’s not even sure if the Doctor can get drunk at all.





	let your heart be light (next year all our troubles will be out of sight)

**Author's Note:**

> i wrote this for the thasmin secret santa over on tumblr. happy holidays!

_New York City. 1936. A Christmas party._

Music is streaming through the room, and the only reason it’s not decidedly cold in here is all the people dancing and drinking. Most of them finished their second glass of champagne a while ago. Off to the side of the large ballroom, the Doctor has been trying to teach Yaz the waltz for the better part of an hour. Yaz doubts she knows what she’s doing.

A couple glares at them when the Doctor twirls too far to the left for the third time tonight, and Yaz pulls her back in, barely avoiding a crash. In a beat, the Doctor is right back in her space, her hand on the small of her back sending goosebumps over Yaz’ skin.

“See? We’re getting better. I think,” she says. Yaz chuckles, because they really aren’t at all, and yet, she knows she would scoot around in wobbly circles for hours if it meant seeing the Doctor beam at her so unabashedly, the entire universe reflected on her face.

“We should get dessert,” the Doctor mumbles. She tugs at the straps of her dress, scrunching her face in displeasure, and the corners of Yaz mouth pull up into a smile almost instantaneously, utterly charmed. The dress is beautiful, floor length and midnight blue, and it’s covered in enough shimmering sequins that in her eyes, she almost seems to glow.

They continue spinning around, the creamy satin of Yaz’ dress shining in the lights. She’s about to step off the dancefloor to go look for the dessert table when the Doctor drops her hand and goes back to picking at the sequins on her dress.

“Uh, I hate this dress,” she grumbles, tugging on the straps again. One of them has slid off her shoulder already, hanging loosely against her upper arm.

Yaz watches her start picking at the sequins around her hips, pushing them back and forth and squirming the entire time, and she can’t help but notice that she’s flushed and sweaty, her chest heaving slightly. Her hands are reaching for the back zipper now, and that’s when Yaz quickly grabs her hand and marches to one of the corner windows. She pulls the curtains closed behind them, just in time for the Doctor to push off the offending garment.

“God, that was the absolute worst,” she says. Yaz just gapes, relieved that the Doctor isn’t standing in the middle of a Christmas party in her underwear.

The Doctor’s tousled her hair into a bit of a mess. Even the skin on her stomach is slightly red from all the fabric pulling earlier. Yaz swallows and tries not to stare. The dress lies in a pool of fabric on the floor, and it’s very distracting. So is the Doctor standing undressed in front of her.

“What a terrible part of being a woman that is. I don’t think I can do it,” the Doctor continues, not particularly bothered about being undressed with only a curtain between her and hundreds of other people. Yaz would be mortified.

“Well, you don’t have to wear a dress as a woman. Not if you don’t want to,” she tells her . She’s decidedly looking out the old yellow windows instead of at the Doctor’s exposed skin, although maybe the windows are still new in the year they’re in. They don’t look like it. Outside, snow starts falling, and the Doctor is still not wearing her dress. Whenever it snows in Sheffield, her job gets so much more stressful, but she loves the sense of peace the white flakes bring. It reminds of the first time she saw snow, visiting family in Pakistan.

“As a rule, I probably should, right? I just feel like maybe I’m doing this wrong,” the Doctor interrupts her thoughts.

Yaz shifts her gaze from the window pane to look at her. “No, not at all. There’s nothing for you to do wrong. I promise.”

She says it with as much insistence as possible and hopes the Doctor understands. She’s never seemed like she cared much for the rules of womanhood, but maybe it’s starting to affect her after all.

“I do want a piece of cake. Or two…”, she trails off and gestures vaguely around her chest area and the rest of her body. Yaz swallows hard, and finds a soft smile somewhere, looking up. There has to be something they can do.

“I’ll find you a suit, ok? Just try not to draw any attention. You’re kind of…not dressed,” Yaz says hurriedly, gesturing vaguely at her.

The Doctor nods solemnly and holds the dress against the front of her body. “I can manage that. Probably! I hope.”

Yaz squeezes her wrist as a goodbye and slips through the heavy curtains in search of some more suitable clothing. Once she is gone, the Doctor tosses her dress to the side and huddles up on the sofa in front of the large window. The windows are old and cold air is streaming in through the cracks between them and the walls.  
The Doctor starts painting circles on the fogged windows, the party an ebbing and flowing murmur behind the curtains. When Yaz returns, she’s covered half the window in little drawings.

“So, this house is seriously massive, but I found this upstairs. Hope you like bowties”, Yaz declares as she unfolds a pile of black and white clothes.

“I love a bowtie!” The Doctor jumps up in excitement, and in her haste she immediately slips on the pile of sequined fabric on the floor, and in one swoop she’s falling towards the ground. On instinct, she grabs Yaz by the arms before she can hit the hardwood floor.With her fingers wrapped around her biceps, it’s as if the Doctor’s fizzing energy is rushing right into her.

Up close, she can see every single freckle on the Doctor’s face. She glances at the cluster near the corner of her mouth, wondering just for a second what would happen if she moved forward a bit. Yaz knows she’s been caught when the Doctor drops her hands so swiftly she almost slips again. The guilt in the other woman’s eyes tempts her to pry, but she gets the feeling it wouldn’t end well. After all, they hardly ever touch. When they do it’s through layers of clothes, the Doctor deliberate in maintaining physical distance.

So instead, she hands over the suit and drops down onto the couch, idly tracing over the little drawings the Doctor put on the window. When the Doctor’s finally dressed again, she holds out both arms, the sleeves of the suit jacket hanging past her hands like sad little wings. She flaps them once, twice, grinning.

“You look like a penguin.”

The Doctor tilts her head to the side in contemplation and flaps her sleeves again, grinning to herself. “Thank you”, she says, gently touching Yaz’ arm again. The fabric of the sleeve is a little rough, but the Doctor’s eyes are nothing but affectionate.

Before Yaz can do anything, the Doctor has left their little hideout, still in the middle of rolling up her sleeves. She’s probably headed straight for the desserts. Yaz follows another circle pattern with her index finger and then gets up.

Taking a deep breath, she steps back into the party, the string sounds of a Christmas melody she can’t place filling the ballroom. The entire round is lit by a massive chandelier suspended high up on the vaulted ceiling, and two staircases circle the back half of the room, making the place feel more like a castle than a New York townhouse. Chatter is coming from everywhere at once, the room brimming with people and laughter, all around her, Christmas music and alcohol are wrapping the guests into a flurry of excitement.

She’s about to go find the Doctor when an elderly woman approaches her. She’s holding her champagne glass by the stem, taking dainty little sips and then swirling the liquid around for good measure, and Yaz straightens when she speaks.

“Ms. Khan, how wonderful to see you’ve accepted my invitation.”

“Thank you very much for having us,” Yaz replies.

“Oh, it was the least I could do after you helped get rid of those dreadful creatures.”

“It’s what we do.”

The lady takes another sip of champagne and leans in closer.

“I don’t see any of your companions, my dear”, she says.

“Ryan and Gra- I mean Mr. Sinclair and Mr. O’Brien are ill.”

“Oh, what a shame. I did enjoy their company tremendously at dinner last week,” the woman, called Mrs. Sheridan as Yaz now remembers, responds.

Yaz smiles politely, as Mrs. Sheridan pats her arm.

“Enjoy yourself my dear. And please give the Doctor my best wishes,” she says. With another sip of her champagne, she moves on to some other unsuspecting guest, surely to spread more Christmas cheer.

“Yaz, there you are. I have been searching for you everywhere, comes the Doctor’s voice. She says this with her usual overdramatic flair, like a child who lost their parent at a store and was sure they would never meet again, despite the fact that she’s the one who ran off to get…a giant piece of banana cake, apparently.

“I thought I’d lost you.”

“Nope, right here.”

The Doctor breaks off a piece of banana cake and holds it out to Yaz. It doesn’t taste half bad.

They share the rest of the cake and stay late into the night, continuing their attempts at dancing, and Yaz giggles at the improvement. Now that she’s wearing a suit, the Doctor is much better at the waltz.

By the time they leave, the streets are buried in a foot of snow. Even with the ornamented heavy front doors closed behind them, Yaz can still hear the roar of the party inside. At her side, the Doctor glances up.

Blinking, Yaz tilts her head back to follow her gaze, and then she stills. Right above her, there are green leaves and milky berries, tied with a red string.

“Mistletoe”, she breathes. It escapes in only a whisper, her lungs tightening inside her ribcage.The Doctor is staring at her unblinking, tiny snowflakes melting in her tousled hair, and Yaz doesn’t know if she should move.

“Do you mind, Yaz?”, she asks.

Yaz shakes her head, because, no, she doesn’t mind. Not at all. She lets out a breath, warm air dissipating in between them.

The Doctor steps a little closer, the skin around her eyes crinkling. Standing this close, Yaz can count all the freckles on her face. She reaches out, strokes her thumb over the Doctor’s jaw. The warm skin contact makes her ice cold fingers prickle and the moment has gone on too long for just a casual Christmas kiss. There might still be time for an eggnog-tipsy lapse in judgement, but Yaz doesn’t drink. She’s not even sure if the Doctor can get drunk at all.

Taking a deep breath, she plucks up all the courage her Nani and her mother gave her and closes the distance, touching her lips to her friend’s carefully. Her heart is pounding in her ears.

The Doctor kisses her back, first gently and then more insistently, placing her hands on Yaz’ sides. Yaz slides the hand she placed around her jaw up into the Doctor’s hair. It’s soft and she can’t resist scraping at her scalp just a bit. The Doctor sighs into the kiss, pulling Yaz even closer and rubbing her thumbs over her torso. Warm shivers run down her spine. For all her awkward rambling and confused looks, the Doctor knows what she’s doing.

She misses the soft feeling of her lips the instant the Doctor pulls back, tugging on Yaz’ bottom lip on the way. Yaz is sure the world slid a bit off kilter then and there.  
The Doctor’s lips are stained red now, a little bit of Yaz’ lipstick smeared above her upper lip. Her hands are still resting on Yaz’ waist, holding on to a moment that evaporated quicker than the snow on Boxing Day.

“Happy Christmas”, the Doctor says, so low Yaz is unsure if she said anything at all. She tucks a wave that’s fallen out of Yaz’ updo behind her ear and takes a step back. The sprig of mistletoe is still hanging between them.

“Let’s go see if Graham and Ryan are still alright”, the Doctor says and her voice cracks, barely, like the thinnest layer of snow in the morning. She says it like nothing just happened, like she’s really saying something else entirely, like the other shoe hasn’t dropped yet but it surely will. In three bounds she’s down on the pavement, gesturing at Yaz to follow, and Yaz does. As she carefully walks down, the snow crunches under her heels.

They walk down the streets that are slowly being covered in white, orange light illuminating the way. The Doctor is animatedly babbling about the reason each snowflake is unique and Yaz is listening, watching the snow fall around them and settle on their coats and scarves. She wonders if the Doctor knows that sometimes her words sound different, like they didn’t start out English, like they were transferred from another universe. Wonders if the Doctor knows that the TARDIS translator can’t always capture the full breadth of what she is saying.

The Doctor glances over her shoulder at Yaz and smiles. As her hands underline every rapid word, her eyes sparkle with the same joy as ever and Yaz can’t find it within herself to be upset. Not right now, not over this. She just folds it up and tucks it away, another snow covered memory to cherish. She’s seen other planets, other civilizations, people who could crumble entire planets, but this night has definitely been her favorite adventure so far.

**Author's Note:**

> i hope you enjoyed and merry christmas! if you liked it please feel free to leave a comment.


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